Sun 9:30a Class; 10:30a Worship; 11:35a Communion
Bible Bites
Dying into Eternal Life
Sverre Norborg was a Norwegian theologian, author, and philosopher who spent a large part of his adult life in America. In a chapter on the resurrection in his 1936 book, What is Christianity?, he tells the following story.
He occupied a ward together with eight other tuberculosis patients. It was his last springtime. He never saw the dogwood blossom. It was one of those early spring days when the gentle south wind wafts in upon the land the breath of new life. I came into the ward of these young men. Christopher beckoned to me to come over: "We too are going to have a real Easter this year. Our superintendent says a radio is being brought in; that will make it possible for us also to be along in the services." His pale face shone in anticipation.
Good Friday came and the blessed radio waves carried the invisible Word. It reached Christopher. In the afternoon I came through the corridor. Again he beckoned me, more radiant than ever: "It is Easter today." "Indeed," I answered, "it is Good Friday and . . ." He became very quiet. In a moment, "I guess you do not understand. It is Easter today." With his emaciated white hands, he pointed to his heart. He had laid hold on the words which had created Easter! "He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon Him." It was long before we parted. There in a hospital ward we worshiped together that Good Friday afternoon.
At three o’clock the next morning, the pastor was hurriedly summoned to the hospital. Christopher had had a hemorrhage. He had reached his journey’s end. He lay in a heavy sleep on the very threshold of death. Just once toward the end he roused himself, and his last word was a greeting. His voice was almost gone, as he turned on the very threshold of eternity and whispered that last greeting: "It is Easter today." There he died into eternal life. (69–70)
There are times when our soul drags our body where our body doesn’t want to go—Stanley Jones told of a French marshal whose hand trembled as he shaved on the eve of a battle: "Tremblest thou, vile carcass? Thou wouldst tremble more if thou knewest where I am going to take you this day." And there are times when our body drags our soul where our soul doesn’t want to go. Our body is on a journey to death, the last place our soul wants to go. Though our heart may fail us on this trek, we are committed and cannot back out.
And this is why what Norborg wrote is so lovely. Don’t get hung up over the fact that he said things differently than you might have said them; what he said gets to the genius of Christianity.
Can you think of anything worse than having to face the reality of death haunted by the inadequacies of life? To feel this terror is to instinctively yearn for Christ’s resurrection, for His resurrection is the answer to every inadequacy. His resurrection is what puts the strength of God into our heart. Life was the gift Jesus carried in His hand (Jn. 10.10), and His resurrection is the basis for believing that we can receive the gift He brought, in a never ending way.
"I am the Resurrection and the Life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live" (Jn. 11.25). Blessed indeed are they who hold Christ in their heart; such people don’t die, they but pass into life.
— In The Prairie Papers
